Invitation to Listening Sessions on Protecting Students from Sexual Assault

The White
House Task Force to Protect Students from Sexual Assault is pleased to
announce that we will be holding a series of virtual, public listening sessions
in February. The Department of Justice, Office of Violence Against Women,
in partnership with the Department of Education, Office for Civil Rights, and
the Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, will be hosting these
sessions, and our colleagues from the White House, the Office of the Vice
President, and the Agencies serving on the Task Force will also be
participating. We want you to join us!

Many people have contacted us
about how to provide input into the Task Force, and we are eager to hear from
you. Your expertise, research and experiences are invaluable to this
process. The Task Force is looking for concrete and creative ideas about
how schools can prevent sexual assault, and how they can better respond when it
happens – both in terms of supporting survivors and holding offenders
accountable.

The listening sessions are
designed to allow as many people as possible to provide input. We won’t
be answering questions, but instead will be listening to you. If you have
questions, we will gather them for a future response.

We have three different Students
and Survivors listening sessions, spread over three weeks, to accommodate the
demand within our webinar capacity. If you’re not a student or survivor,
please don’t join this session – you might unintentionally block a student or
survivor from participating. If you are a student or survivor, we would
appreciate you joining one of these three sessions.

Listening sessions will use the
Adobe Connect webinar service, which allows participants to queue up to make
verbal comments. Participants can also type comments in a chat box.
We expect a large number of participants, so please plan to keep your remarks
brief – about 3 minutes – so more people can have a turn to speak.

Streaming ASL interpretation is
available upon request. When you register for your choice of listening
session, just select the ASL box.

If you don’t get the chance to
speak or still have more to say, don’t worry – you can submit written
comments. Comments can be submitted any time from now until February 28,
2014. If you would like to submit comments, email them to OVW.SATaskForce@usdoj.gov.

Kindly note, these calls will be
off-the-record, and not intended for press purposes.